Parliamentary Democracy in Bangladesh: Problems and Prospects
Democracy is a relatively fashionable term in the political science literature that might be used gainfully to comprehend the nature of state authority, its performance, effectiveness and control. It implies a mode of governance that includes some form of widespread participation of the people who are governed. Democratic ethos is, therefore, stresses voting in free and fair election that serves a variety of functions ranging from the choice of the government and the exercise of influence over public policies to the expression of the dissent and repudiation of those persons and policies which majority electorate no longer support. Democracy is found to be both parliamentary (UK, India) and Presidential (USA) form across the globe. It is a very delicate system and it functions well in a society which has developed a kind consensus in respect of the use of power, acquisition of power, peaceful transfer of power and also in respect of the critical national issues. Though Bangladesh has introduced parliamentary democracy as political system but it has failed to establish democracy as an institution even after thirty eight years of its independence. Specially, after the restoration and resumption of parliamentary democracy followed by a decade-long struggle, the people of Bangladesh expected a distinguishing mode of democratic governance which would sharply contrast with the previous military and military-bureaucratic regimes. But, people are now bewildered and disenchanted with the rule of democratically elected governments and their apathy of letting the parliamentary democracy to be flourished in the country. Against this backdrop, this study makes an effort to look into the overall state of democracy in Bangladesh with the focus on political institutions and leadership. It also attempts to analyzes the bottlenecks and at the same time prospects and factors in favour of institutionalization of democracy in Bangladesh. Finally, this paper suggests a set of measures to be undertaken in an effort to institutionalize democracy in Bangladesh.
by badrul